


Straight to the Heart

by orangefriday



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff and Angst, Galra Keith (Voltron), M/M, bare with me, i have't written in ages, please tell me how you feel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 06:14:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15237189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orangefriday/pseuds/orangefriday
Summary: Keith crashes onto Earth and all its beauty that is Shiro.





	Straight to the Heart

**Author's Note:**

> My first Voltron fic and fic in YEARS! I'm absolutely in love with Voltron and all its possibilities. And I hope to write more so please, I'm totally open for prompts or writing challenges. I need to get my ass back to writing!
> 
> Anyway, please enjoy!

Keith meets Shiro in the desert. 

Maybe it was the sweltering heat that drew out milky waves from the sand. Or maybe it was Keith’s head dizzy and soaring from dehydration. But Shiro, pale skin kissed golden by the lowering sun, looked _glorious_. 

He doesn’t quite register Shiro’s questioning words. He sees Shiro’s mouth move, watches as steady fingers brush along the side of his own face, quivering just slightly over his cut. Keith watches the ground escape from him as he’s lifted up. He still doesn’t quite feel himself being herded into the inside of a rusting vehicle stopped at the side of a road, A road Keith had been walking toward for vagras. He does, however, feel Shiro’s eyes; shining grey and haloed by concern and the gentlest of softness.

The lip of a bottle is pressed against Keith’s dry, cracking lips and the open cuts protest against the water that drips out of it. The back of his throat rejoices though, welcoming the sweet cool taste. 

He’s being laid out in the back now while hands pat against his body, probably checking for wounds. He doesn’t feel it still, but the vehicle is cooler than the scorching vastness of the desert and Keith lets out a sigh. 

The lining of the ceiling inside is old and droops off of its skeleton. Wondering where and what he was in and wanting to drag his fingers against the lint-filled fabric, Keith lifts up a weak hand, but Shiro catches his fingers. He brings them to his own chest, speaking wordlessly to Keith in a soothing deep voice.

Keith doesn’t hear the words. Just turns to stare at Shiro’s eyes again. And he feels the universe then, settle beneath him and wrap itself all around them in this moment.

He falls. Black embraced them.

 

*

 

Earth is beautiful, Keith admits. Even in the desert, as he slowly felt his body succumb to the heat and his feet sink into the endless sands, he saw the beauty in his misery. Its youthful slowness reflecting itself in the way an Earth day progressed, from scorching moments when the star was highest in the sky to breezy twilights and finally to dewy dawns. The Orion Arm was lucky to harbour such a planet. Its existence one of a billion possibilities.

Krolia had always spoken about her time on Earth in a misty yet heavy way. She told him of nights filled with flying lights that tickled your cheeks and deafening afternoons that bled unrelenting stillness and heat. And she laughed when she would recall those moments spent with his father and grew incredibly quiet when these stories came to an end. Sometimes, Keith will lose her as she speaks of these wonders. He would call out to her again and again. It took time, but when she did, the light in her eyes dimmed as if there was nothing left to see. 

It was as if she both adored and felt pained by the memories of this planet.

But she was gone now. He had called out for her for the last time. And now, he had the entire universe to face all by himself.

 

*

“You should eat more,” Shiro says, his hand heavy on Keith’s shoulder.

He touches Ketih entirely too much. Unnecessarily so. Keith wonders if it’s a human thing or if it’s just not a Galra thing.

Keith takes a moment to revel in the warmth as Shiro’s fingers become some sort of pleasant static heat. He thinks it should take him more strength not to shrug Shiro off but it’s easy. He just lets Shiro touch him. After all, Keith had been alone for so long he had forgotten what it felt like.

“I’m fine,” Keith whispers. His voice is still hoarse from spending three sun ups and downs in the desert. Eating doesn’t help. Food is different on Earth (“Miso soup,” Shiro said once and then “Cake,” he says another time. “Toast” hurt the most.). There are too many _kinds_ and it all scrapes unapologetically down his esophagus but Keith still swallows because the taste explodes something great on his tongue every time.

Shiro looks worried. Keith wonders what other faces this human has. Despite this, Shiro doesn’t push any further and lets his hand drop from Keith’s shoulder, leaving emptiness there. A small smile spreads across his face and Keith has the momentary want to _touch_.

That feeling is harder to push down. 

Shiro had brought them to a house in the desert after he had found Keith. It’s not his or anybody’s. Just a lone house in the middle of nowhere like a planet that had an explosion of life where it shouldn’t have been possible. Shiro had been clear to let him know this (“No one can find us here,” he says). So here they are, inside a battered house with four walls adorned with wrinkling patterns of flora he doesn’t recognize. Earthly things that Krolia had told him about and drawn in the dirt.

He wonders if Krolia had originally crashed on a planet with jungles and wet storms, alive with breath and sounds, if Keith would’ve still felt the pull to leave and find another place. 

He might not have come here if he didn't.

“I have to go into town. Get a few things and talk to a few people” Shiro says. He doesn’t get up or take his eyes away from Keith. “It’ll be a while. Maybe a day at most.”

Keith nods. Shiro has explained before, in the first few moments two Earth days ago when Keith woke up again, that _town_ was far and where food was. Though, it seems like they have plenty so he doesn’t know why Shiro needs to go back. He also wonders _who_ these people are that Shiro needs to tell things to. What will he say to them? Do they worry about Shiro like Shiro seems to worry about Keith?

But Keith knows _town_ is also where Shiro lives and where he is expected to be. Not in the desert. Not in this house that belonged to nobody. Not with Keith.

“Okay,” Shiro says finally. It sounds like a question he’s too afraid to ask. So he continues to stare at Keith, like he’s some sort of problem that needs to be put together and solved. Shiro’s gaze is heat and sweet all at the same time. It traces the newly healed scar on Keith’s cheek. It’s hard for Keith to understand what it all means.

A breath. And then, the words come out of Keith with ease, “I’m not going anywhere.”

Shiro smiles wider.

 

*

 

He waits for Shiro under the shade of the house whenever he goes to town. (“Do you… uh… get sunburnt?” Shiro asks, looking pointedly at Keith’s hued skin. Keith doesn’t know what that means so Shiro shows him _tan lines_ and _peeling skin_.) He lays his entire body into the ground and digs his heels deep into the Earth, listening. He lets the sands wash over him, feathering his forehead and weaving through his fingertips as it paints his violet skin an ashy grey. Keith follows the shade like a planet orbiting a star. 

Where he and Krolia landed, there was no shade or night or day. Time was recorded by the ship’s clock. Once, the ship’s power shut down and Keith had no way of knowing how much time he had lost. Krolia did not mourn like Keith did. She only went along her way to placid the ship. Keith had been younger then. He thought all had fallen: their shelter, their resource, time. 

His way out.

But Krolia fixed it. It took time, so much time that Keith had been convinced he had turned another age. The ship had whirred back to life. It had sounded like the desert winds when its life source hummed with activity again.

For a moment then, his young eager self thought maybe Krolia had truly, really, _fixed_ the ship. 

But no, she hadn’t. She never did and never will. 

“Keith.”

Shiro stood over him with two bags in his one hand, He’s a dark silhouette with white light casting an outline of muscle and expanse. Keith drinks in scenes like these, finding it incredible the different types of lights Earth’s star makes. 

Shiro only ever leaves for a few hours now, not a day like he did the first time. He had come back with a bag of clothes for himself and Keith (they were too big even for his own tall frame) and another set of blankets and pillows to sleep with. Shiro had shown Keith the _newspaper_ then (“It’s how people tell each other updates about things going on in the world,” Shiro explains.). The front pictured a large hole in the desert. Empty.

Shiro says the newspaper called it a crater caused by an asteroid. And Shiro’s been talking to _people_ and these people think so too. 

But he tells Keith he saw his ship thunder through the desert night sky and since then, Shiro had been looking for him.

“Yes, Shiro?” Keith says with a smile. He doesn’t know he’s smiling until he’s heard himself practically _sing_ Shiro’s name.

Shiro’s laughing now and points to Keith’s barefoot and ankle. It’s been in the light for a while now. (Keith has no ship to tell time but time on Earth seems not to matter too much.)

“I think that answers my question,” Shiro says. He shakes his head and adjusts his grip on the bags. 

Yes, Keith _does_ get sunburns. He learns this a few hours after coming back into the house to help Shiro put away groceries and refusing Shiro’s advice to “dip his foot in water” (Whatever that meant). The stinging and _hurt_ crept in gradually. Pretty soon, pricks of a thousand bites started to tag all along the skin of his foot. Shiro took Keith’s foot gingerly in his hands and applied some sort of cooling salve, reassuring Keith over and over again with an amused smile that everything will heal.

Keith learns that day that tan lines and peeling skin come _after_ burns and excruciating pain. He also learns Shiro is capable of another face: one that is so abundant with tenderness that Keith doesn’t mind too much of the pain if it meant seeing Shiro look at him like that. 

The next time Shiro goes to town, he buys Keith something called _sunscreen._

 

_*_

 

Keith and Shiro share a bed. 

There’s only one bed after all and the couch is as hard as the rock that Keith had lived on his entire life until now. 

Shiro had taken the couch the first week. He said Keith needed space to heal and to rest even though Shiro seemed to be the one that woke up with pains and aches that needed healing. He hadn’t let Keith leave the bed unless to relieve or clean himself for almost a week. Food was prepared and brought to him in bed. The first time Shiro left, he also brought back something called a _laptop_ and said he had downloaded _shows_ and _movies_ for Keith to watch. Keith didn’t protest for days about not being allowed to leave his bed. 

He learned about Earth. He learned there were seconds, minutes, hours, and days. Centuries of civilizations that no longer existed and years of wars followed by bursts of knowledge and advances. He learned humans had animals that they both cared for and loved and animals that they killed and ate (“I think you’re a cat person,” Shiro teased. Keith protests that he’s more of a dog person but he still doesn’t admit it when he gets caught up watching hours of cat videos.). Keith learned Earth knew very little about the galaxy. It takes them decades when it would only take Keith a few days to reach the depths of the Milky Way. They thought they were the only lifeforms in the entire vast universe.

Keith also learns that humans touched. A lot. They shook hands, held hands, high five’d, and clapped each other’s backs. They also embraced both briefly and deeply. Often times, these embraces end up becoming kisses on the mouth. They’re not like the kisses Krolia used to give him. She only would ever just brush her lips on his temple, promising him she’d be back when she flew out of atmosphere to see if there was anyone out there. Human kisses are different. Just like the touches humans give. 

It explains why Shiro holds his hands when he teaches Keith to slice tomatoes (“Don’t stab them!”). It explains why Shiro smooths over Keith’s hair all the time, shaking out the grains of sand after a day of lying in it. 

It also helps explain to Keith as to why, one night when Shiro’s asleep, his breath coming out slow and long, that Keith dared to press tentative fingertips against Shiro’s closed eyelids. It explains why he traces the scar on Shiro’s face, the raised skin surprisingly smooth. He wonders how Shiro got it and how badly it must’ve hurt. And it explains why Keith moves in, grabbing a fistful of bed sheets to move himself closer to Shiro. So close that Keith feels their breaths melt together.

He feels all the air leave his lungs as he presses his lips against Shiro’s.

Keith doesn’t pull away. Not even when he sees Shiro’s eyes open, silver gleaming in the night light. His face is unreadable to Keith and for a moment, he thinks he’s done something wrong. But Shiro closes his eyes again and with a shuddering warm sigh, gently grabs the back of Keith’s neck. He brings Keith even _closer_ and pushes this hot fervent need into the kiss that Keith finds himself mirroring.

His heart slams against his chest, violent and unyielding. Its beat is loud with power that he knows only Shiro possesses. Blood gushes out and fills up every crevice of his being. Keith imagines this is what it’s like for stars when they reach supernova. 

He feels like he’s falling into himself as Shiro pushes Keith onto his back, now on top of him and pressing his entirety onto Keith. Fingers bury into hair and bodies desperate to fill in every empty space between them.

They’re breathless, wanting, feeling, and heaving with desire. 

Keith’s never had a home but his way home was right in front of him now. It went straight to the heart.

 

*

 

Keith shows Shiro his ship the next day. 

It’s miles away from the crater. When he crashed, after plummeting into the earth, his flight protocols were still intact. Just long enough for Keith to fly the blasted thing up again a few inches off the ground and away. He hid it under a hill of sand and ever since, has been feeling the machine through the earth everyday. 

“You speak to it?” Shiro asks in bewilderment. He can’t take his eyes off the ship and he tells Keith he swears he can hear it roaring in his ear. 

“She speaks to me,” Keith says and lays a hand gently on the nose of the ship, feeling the exposed parts where he shovelled the sand away to show Shiro. Its black muzzle grows hot quick under the scorching sun. “Do you want to know what she’s saying?”

Shiro nods incredulously, kneels in front of it and reaches out. His hand barely even touches the surface and suddenly, it’s whirring to life with a fiery, thunderous growl that they’re both sure will echo across the planet for hours. 

Her eyes _shine._

Keith smiles at Shiro and kneels beside him, taking Shiro’s other free hand. He remembers Krolia drifting away from him for the last time, spent and given up, unable to heal from her loss. He remembers himself crying to the deafening silence of space and its crushing loneliness. Then hearing the guttural growl deep in his bones as a response. It filled his entire being with purpose, swayed his mind and his soul to _go._ Before he could even realize, he was flying. 

Then he was falling into a light so bright, it was hard to even think about ever going back to a time without it. He knows how Krolia must have felt. To only know the light as a memory, never to be felt or seen again. 

He grips onto Shiro, feels the strength in him that he knows he would follow to every corner of the universe for.

“What is she saying?” Shiro asks softly, eyes wide with wonder. Keith drinks in the sight of Shiro, who is truly everything and all things he is ever meant to be.

Keith whispers, _“You found me.”_


End file.
